My Brain Needs Stimulating

Hi all, I hope you are all in good health. My last four posts have all been about preparing for surgery in order to make you stay as smooth as possible and assist recovery. I was then going to write about how to cope with situations whilst you are actually in hospital. However, I will be having Deep Brain Stimulation surgery for essential tremor in about six weeks and have just started going through the testing process in order to be prepared for my day under the knife, and I thought it would be extremely valuable to write about my experiences as they happened.

So I feel a good place to start my DBS series is to answer the question "why am I having it?" After all, my life is not in danger without the surgery and my friends and family think I look fine and interact with society perfectly well and they understand my affliction and it doesn't bother them. Well it bothers me! I live with it 24/7 and I want it gone. I think that the best way for people to get a better understanding of what a tremor patient has to live with is to give you a snap shot of my morning. You can try it if you like:-

1. Alarm goes off. Accidentally knock it off the bed side table trying to turn it off.
2. Shower - Nearly scold then freeze yourself trying to get the water temp right.
3. Shower - Drop soap three times.
4. Shower - Poke self in eye trying to wash hair and face.
5. Shaving - Yeah, you can figure this one out yourself.
6. Teeth - Put too much tooth paste on brush, and get some on the bench.
7. Teeth - Clean up bence.
8. Teeth - Ouch! Poke self in back of mouth with brush.
9. Clothes - Try buttoning shirt, give up and wear a t-shirt.
10. Clothes - Slip-on shoes only, laces too hard.
11. Kids - Dressing son too hard, send to his mother.
12. Breakfast - Spill milk on floor
13. Breakfast - Clean up milk (kids are getting impatient)
14. Breakfast - No tea or coffee. Only drinks that are out of the bottle
15. Kids - Accidentally hit daughter on her head with the hair brush (tears)
16. Phone - incorrectly enter PIN twice, so get wife to do the third and final try.
17. Leaving - Unlock door to house accidentally dropping keys in the process.

Finally I have left the house. My work day is yet to begin and I am already exhausted. I haven't even tried to write or type or even eaten properly. As with many diseases, especially movement disorders, essential tremor governs the things you buy, the activities you partake in, where you go, the choices you make and the people you see. Arresting the tremor is not simply a convenience thing, it is a fundamental shift in the quality of ones life and unshackling the burden that enslaves its sufferers everyday.

For fellow sufferers of movement disorders, I hope that this helps validate what you have always known, and for carers I hope that this will help you better understand what a sufferer has to go through and why they make the decisions that they do. Next week I am off to the clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist for assessment for DBS. I will let you know how it goes. Until then, stay well:)